


Rub-a-Dub Dub (A Bunch of Capes in the Tub)

by Traincat



Category: Justice League & Justice League Unlimited (Cartoons)
Genre: Crack, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-23
Updated: 2012-12-23
Packaged: 2017-11-22 03:58:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,156
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/605577
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Traincat/pseuds/Traincat
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>“Holy cats!” Oliver said, dropping the sponge. There was still conditioner in his beard. </i>
</p><p>
  <i>“I think you mean, holy bats,” Bruce intoned.</i>
</p><p> A bunch of times Batman ambushed people in the shower, and a time or two someone ambushed him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Rub-a-Dub Dub (A Bunch of Capes in the Tub)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [rapacityinblue](https://archiveofourown.org/users/rapacityinblue/gifts).



> I don't know, I'm just as fascinated with Bruce's weirdo shower skulking behavior as you. I hope you have a lovely yuletide, rapacityinblue!

_Gorilla Grodd_

Grodd was halfway through a rousing rendition of _Toucha-Toucha-Touch Me_ when he saw the bat-shaped outline hulking just beyond the shower curtain.

“Well,” he said tersely. “This is embarrassing.”

“Tell me about it,” Batman said.

 

_Green Arrow_

“Holy cats!” Oliver said, dropping the sponge. There was still conditioner in his beard. 

“I think you mean, holy bats,” Bruce intoned, drawing his cape a little closer around him. 

Ollie aimed the sponge square at his face.

 

_Amanda Waller (Round Two)_

This time, Amanda Waller was waiting, fully dressed in a now quite damp powersuit and holding an experimental plasma cannon.

 

_The Flash_

“Uh,” Wally said, holding the shampoo bottle frozen halfway to his mouth like a microphone. “I had the urge to herbal?”

“You’re late for a League meeting,” Bruce said, feeling a twitch coming on just beneath his eyebrow.

“Right,” Wally said. He reached out and snagged the curtain, pulling it around him. “Give me a second here, Bats?” 

“You have two,” Bruce told him. “And get rid of that tattoo.”

Wally looked down at the Justice League symbol stamped on his hip and turned as red as his hair.

“It’s a temp!” he yelled after Bruce’s retreating back. “Please don’t tell the rest of the League about this!”

 

_Superman_

Clark lay in an ungainly sprawl in the bathtub, one leg hanging over the edge. The torn shower curtain fluttered gently down to cover him. He cleared his throat. 

“Bruce,” he said stiffly. “What a pleasant surprise. And by that I mean – what is wrong with you?”

“We need to talk,” Bruce said. 

“You need to hold that pose,” Lois said from the doorway. A camera flash went off, and then Lois was shaking a polaroid picture and giving him a pointed look. “And now you need to get the hell out of our bathroom.”

 

_Nightwing, Batgirl and Robin_

Dick, Barbara and Tim were standing in the bathroom, in full costume and scowling. Well, Dick was scowling. Barbara was trying not to snicker, and Tim was playing some kind of handheld game. 

There was a banner draped across Bruce’s shower, reading ‘INTERVENTION.’ Someone had drawn on a little border of batarangs; Bruce had to give them points for style.

Dick was also, for some reason, covered in glitter. Bruce didn’t ask why about these things anymore. 

“This is an intervention,” Dick said, jerking a thumb towards the banner. “You can’t keep ambushing people in the shower, Bruce! It’s getting weird!”

“I’m Batman,” Bruce said, and swung a towel dramatically over his shoulders. If teenagers were going to invade his shower, he’d just go use the steam room down in the cave. “I can do whatever I want.”

“Other sidekicks are starting to talk, you know!” Dick shouted after him.

 

_Lex Luthor_

“Have you no concept of privacy?” Luthor demanded, hurriedly wrapping a towel around his waist. “No basic human decency?”

“Look who’s talking,” Bruce said. He eyed the object in Luthor’s hand. “Do you usually shower with that?”

Luthor’s face blanched. He swiftly hid the Superman rubber duck away. “MERCY! Get in here!”

 

_Green Lantern_

“And that,” John said, idly sipping a cup of coffee and watching Booster Gold run shrieking down the Watchtower hallway, towel streaming in his wake, “in case you were wondering, is why I shower off world.”

“No one was wondering,” Shayera said, raising her eyebrows over her tankard.

“I kind of was,” Wally admitted.

 

_Circe_

A pair of deceptively delicate hands snagged Bruce by the cape, drawing him in under the waterfall. Circe smiled beguilingly.

“What a pleasant surprise,” she said, running a finger down the bat symbol. Her bathing suit left little to the imagination. “Tell me -- do you like to sing in the shower too?”

Bruce ducked just in time to dodge the boulder Diana threw. 

 

_The Joker_

“Oh the nerve of you, Batsy,” the Joker said, sliding one hand up his soapy chest. His eyelashes fluttered beneath his flowered shower cap. “Catching me at my slippery unawares. Whatever will become of me now!” 

He pressed a dramatic hand to his forehead. 

“Yowza, Mr. J!” Harley Quinn called encouragingly from the doorway. 

Bruce let the shower curtain fall closed and suspected afterwards that he shouldn’t have been surprised when it exploded.

Or when he found out that the Joker’s flowered shower shoes sprayed acid.

 

_Amanda Waller (Round Three)_

There was a SWAT team in Amanda Waller’s shower.

 

_The Injustice League_

There was a long moment of awkward silence. 

“Look,” Luthor said at last, as both he and Star Sapphire judiciously made use of the Ultra-Humanite’s bulk by slinking behind him. “Let’s level here. This isn’t the most awkward thing you’ve ever caught me doing.”

“Not by a longshot,” Bruce said. Next to him, Clark cleared his throat, awkwardly looking anywhere but the obvious. Diana stared stonefaced at the group of supervillains in the League’s locker room, while Ollie settled for slapping his knees in laughter. “At least you didn’t bring the Superman rubber ducky this time.”

“The what now?” Clark asked, alarmed, as the rest of the damp supervillains all swiveled to stare at Luthor. He cleared his throat and glared at Bruce.

“Such a shame,” the Joker said sadly. “If you’d brought yours, I would have brought mine.”

 

_Catwoman_

Selina’s slinky bathrobe slipped off one shoulder as she flipped on the light. She arched an eyebrow at the sight of Bruce standing in her hotel shower. 

“Well,” she said. “You can stay or leave, but either way, I’m taking a soak.”

Bruce reached down and yanked the string of diamonds and pearls out of the drain. He gave Selina a pointed look. 

“Would you believe that was there when I got here?” she asked, smiling. He didn’t blink. She shrugged. “Well, the previous offer still stands."

 

_Batman_

Bruce shucked the cape and cowl first, then the gloves and the boots. The belt he placed on the counter and the rest of the suit fell to the floor, grimy and battleworn that it was. He spared himself the briefest of glances in the mirror, cataloging the bruises from the night’s fight, then yanked the hot water all the way on and climbed into his shower. 

The hot water soothed his tired, aching muscles, and the steam fogged up the whole room, obscuring the rest of the world from view.

For a moment, Bruce could let himself just be – not be the flighty billionaire philanthropist, not be Gotham’s favorite son, not be the caped crusader. Just be. 

But only for a moment. He switched the water off and drew back the shower curtain. 

Only to find Alfred in his bathroom, dusting behind his medicine cabinet, bat-laundry already gathered up and utility belt slung neatly over his shoulder. He spared Bruce the briefest of glances.

“Really, Master Bruce,” he tutted. “You mustn’t keep forgetting to wash behind your ears.”

Bruce grumbled, grabbed a towel and stomped out the door.


End file.
